It started with an iPhone in the colonies

Then we blogged/wiki-ed.

Then they converted the first franchise into collective agreements.

[Brian Gable, The Globe and Mail]

Every system should have a franchisee-generated wiki

Don’t bring a knife to a gun fight.

Superior information and intellect has always toppled tyrants.

How many franchisee advocates does it take to infect a whole system?

Depends on the skill and toxicity of the lone wolf.

It starts with a WordPress blog like one of these 18.

Franchisees have credibility, external experts do not

Just do it.

Seth Godin has post a good post on the human tendency to over-rate the importance of the beginner and novice stages.

The problem in The Myth of Preparation:

We diddle around in the novice stage because we’re afraid. We polish (but not too much) and go to meetings (plenty of them) and look for deniability, spending hours and hours instead of shipping. And the product, in the end, is not so much better.

Godin’s advice?:

Go, give a speech. Go, start a blog. Go, ship that thing that you’ve been hiding. Begin, begin, begin and then improve. Being a novice is way overrated.

Why not start your own 100% anonymous investor-focused WordPress weblog today? Infinitely less risky than talking to any attorney, especially one self-identifying as a “franchise law expert”.

Take a look at the latest from: JamesMasterLies.wordpress.com or review my Links page.

Julian Assange: Why the world needs WikiLeaks

WikiFranchise.org helps create nodes within whistleblowers’ minds.

• It is makes the industry’s weapons of influence redundant.

TED video

The controversial website WikiLeaks collects and posts highly classified documents and video. Founder Julian Assange, who’s reportedly being sought for questioning by US authorities, talks to TED’s Chris Anderson about how the site operates, what it has accomplished — and what drives him. The interview includes graphic footage of a recent US airstrike in Baghdad.

Broken system?: Blog or die

If your franchise system is broken: WordPress weblog software is the  solution.

It is the single most important thing an individual can do to fix what’s broken. Don’t wait for anyone else: do it anonymously because WordPress doesn’t tell anyone who you are (unlike other providers). Anonymity is crucial to demonstrate how important information sharing is.

This post is the best example of the family ramifications I have ever seen. Fancy ain’t got nothing to do with it. Being real, credibility is 100% of the battle. (Read the comments in this +$1-B annual system.)

Ask these people what got the weasels by the short and curlies:

• Australian Franchise Opportunities (see nice post),
• Bakers Delight Lies (known as COBS Bakery in Canada),
• Jeff Lefler’s Blog,
• Franchise Information, Tim Hortons franchise,
• TimHortonsLies

If anyone says you’re not qualified or you’re better “behind closed doors”, they are lying.

Only those who are trying to defeat, control and betray you want you off the internet.

Franchising: just another low trust industry

Seth Godin gets it right about social media.

He  diagnoses franchising’s vulnerabilities correctly In his latest post Lead with your glass jaw:

If you’re in a low trust industry (like car sales), a social media presence dramatically increases the opportunity people have to call you out, beat you up, tattle on you and flame you in public. If you have a Facebook page and people can YELL at you there, for all to see, it makes you vulnerable…

Managing corporate brands by internet file sharing

A nice, light snack?

Simon Houpt and The Globe and Mail: Kit Kat spat goes viral despite Nestlé’s efforts.

A global game of Whack-a-Mole broke out Wednesday on the Internet when YouTube removed a gruesome anti-Nestlé commercial by Greenpeace after the multinational food giant complained, only to have viewers flock to the video-sharing site Vimeo.com, where the spot became an instant cause célèbre because of the reputed censorship.

The 60-second video depicts a bored office worker enjoying a Kit Kat, which rather than being the popular chocolate-hazelnut ladyfinger-style confection, appears to be a chocolate-covered ape finger. As he munches on the treat, it oozes blood over his chin and across his keyboard, shocking his co-workers. “Have a break?” reads the on-screen text. “Give the orangu-tan a break.”

1. Direct link to vimeo video (including comments).

2. Related Vancouver Sun article, Coffee Crisp, Kit Kat pose threat to rainforests: Greenpeace.

Franchisors have no idea what is in store for them.

No clue.

Is confidence in all franchising past the Tipping Point?

The CEO and president of the International Franchise Association, IFA announces his retirement.

And then their board of directors announces that it’s looking for his successor?

• Hello…does anyone talk to each other on the premiere franchisor-dominated trade association any more? Nobody cared on the board of directors enough to do anything until Matt Shay went public?

Don over at Blue MauMau makes a great point in his Importance of succession planning.

It is a healthy sign when a board of directors is strong enough to carry out one of its most fundamental jobs, making sure there is a leadership successor.

In the hidden world of the board room, it is a rare outward sign of possible cronyism or a weak board when it has not carried out this function. A vacuum of leadership in a trade association can be disconcerting to its membership. It can be an incredible opportunity for competitors.

The IFA announced yesterday that it has hired an executive search firm—probably with “urgent”, “critical” and “HELP!” stamped all over the job description packet—to find a suitable candidate to replace its outgoing CEO, Matt Shay. He has given his month notice, April 16.

I added my two cents worth in Excellent point on Leadership continuity.

I suggest every half-baked, local not-for profit plans for their leaders’ recruitment, training and inevitable replacement. Leadership planning is the core competency of any boy scout troop let alone the “brain trust” of everything that goes bump in the night in franchising worldwide.

It seems the IFA Board is in crisis. A crisis, I suggest, that has been triggered by almost no new sales or re-sales in a recession (contrary to past cycles). They denied it first, got angry at scapegoats, bargained with Uncle Tom social medias, sulk/in a funk and then will be dragged unwillingly into accepting a new, higher-quality business model (see death stages).

D’oh!!

The elite’s catching on: their dinosaur practices has pushed the industry past the Tipping Point with investors’ confidence.

And they realize they are powerless because the internet’s reputation mechanism lacks an off switch.

John Q. Public investor is waking up (becoming conscious) to the fact that modern franchising is Unsafe at any Brand.

• This is very good news for franchisees wanting to co-operate with each other and good faith franchisors.

Not so much for the opposite: house negro franchisees and predator franchisors.

The cost to destroy systems has plummeted

It’s almost like a physical law: like a law of gravity. It has always been much cheaper to destroy rather than build.Franchisees know this when they accept the destruction of self-worth, confidence and trust that happens during their contract.

Any small group of franchisees can now deliver a fatal blow to their system because of the almost-free, anonymous digital information sharing.

How franchisees deal with their fight- or-flight-or-freeze response will be interesting to watch.

Not great news for the, generally, neanderthal profiteers  of the old order.

WikiFranchise.org